One of the most anticipated movies of 2024, Joker: Folie à Deux wrapped up its opening weekends playing in over 4,000 theaters with one of the most disappointing box offices in recent memory. Despite most early estimates coming in well over the $100 million mark, the film saw just $37.7 million domestically in its debut weekend, amounting to less than half of what its 2019 predecessor earned. In a year full of box office disappointments, let’s look at how Todd Phillips’ DC Comics spin off ranks among the other major flops of the year.
Joker: Folie à Deux
Release Date: Oct 4
Opening Weekend: $37.7 million
Budget: $190 million
With a budget four times the size of the original, the follow up to 2019’s Joker has been a massive swing and miss for Warner Bros. On pace to lose well over $100 million, hopefully this box office failure does not set a precedent for major studios to take even less risk in financing creative directorial films.
Megalopolis
Francis Ford Coppola’s self-financed imaginative showpiece, Megalopolis, ended in a box office disaster for both the individual funders and Lionsgate. After two weeks of screenings, the film earned under $9 million worldwide, compared to a $120 million production budget. With how eccentric the film is, its box office failure is not all-that surprising. It seems as though there was more at stake here for the filmmakers than simply turning a profit. Still, the budget to materialize Coppola’s vision evidently spiraled out of control to an unattainable number that inevitably deems this movie a massive box office flop.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
Release Date: May 24
Opening Weekend: $26.3 million
Budget: $168 million
Coming off the success of 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, George Miller opted to create a prequel for the franchise centered around Anya Taylor Joy’s Furiosa character. With a 90% percent on Rotten Tomatoes, fans of the Mad Max saga were happy with the final product. However, Warner Bros may have grossly overestimated the number of dedicated Mad Max fans. People simply were not interested enough in a Mad Max prequel to flock to the theaters on Memorial Day Weekend. The film floundered at the box office, losing an estimated $75 million.
Horizon: An American Saga
Release Date: June 28
Opening Weekend: $11 million
Budget: $100 million
Similar to Coppola’s Megalopolis, Horizon: An American Saga is the self-funded brainchild of Kevin Costner, who left the show YellowStone to work on his movie series. The saga features four Western films directed by and starring Costner. The first two were set to be released in the summer of 2024 with a combined budget of $100 million. However, after the first film made just $11 million in its opening weekend in route to a $36 million worldwide gross, the second movie’s theatrical release was canceled. The future of the third and fourth film are currently up in the air, but Kevin Costner’s faith in the project has not wavered.
The Garfield Movie
Release Date: May 24
Opening Weekend: $24 million
Budget: $60 million
Another Memorial Day weekend flop, The Garfield Movie starring Chris Pratt struggled to find viewers, just weeks before Inside Out 2 became one of the most successful animated movies of all time. The filmmakers, however, stuck with a modest $60 million budget for Garfield, which makes the film’s lack of initial financial success all that more palatable. In the end, it earned over $250 million worldwide, good enough to come close to the break even mark in its theatrical window. Accounting for other revenue streams, The Garfield Movie looks like a failure upon first glance, but may have been a somewhat highly profitable endeavor.
Borderlands
Release Date: Aug 9
Opening Weekend: $8.6 million
Budget: $110 million
With the worst wide release opening for a video game movie since the pandemic, Borderlands opened to just $8.6 million. After projecting to make $10 – $20 million just a week before its screening, Borderlands’ severe negative reviews killed any chance it had at theatrical profitability. The film finished its run with $33 million worldwide, well below its $110 million budget. Looking at reviews of the film online, it is not hard to see why this project was such a financial letdown.
Argylle
Release Date: Jan 31
Opening Weekend: $17.5 million
Budget: $200 million
At the end of January, Apple’s Argylle hit theaters and fit right in with the studio’s continued run of box office disappointments. Gathering a grand total of $96 million worldwide, the film did not manage to earn even half of its budget back in ticket sales. However, the $200 million listed budget is the price Apple Studios paid for the movie. Marv Studios likely spent much less actually making it, and probably turned a profit. Still, the film serves as a prime example of the questionable financial decisions from Apple Studios.
Madame Web
Release Date: Feb 14
Opening Weekend: $15.3 million
Budget: $80 million
Another victim of poor reviews, Madame Web took home just $15 million domestically in its opening weekend on its way to a $100 million worldwide total. The superhero action flick fell significantly behind Bob Marley: One Love to finish as the second highest grossing movie on Valentine’s Day weekend. The film had a fairly reasonable $80 million production budget, but still managed to massively underperform. With an enormous amount of criticism harping on the film’s writing, people generally stayed away from buying tickets to Sony’s 2024 Marvel Comics movie.
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
Release Date: April 19
Opening Weekend: $8.9 million
Budget: $60 million
The 2024 Henry Caville – led spy action film, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, was created on a $60 million budget. Although it received mostly positive reception, the film debuted in fourth place domestically the weekend of April 19th, behind Civil War, Abigail, and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. At the end of its theatrical run, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare grossed $27 million globally, achieving its designation as a box office flop.
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